The Lord of the Rings:  The Two Towers (***)
review by Jon Waterman

Time to take that trip once again to that magical world of Middle Earth.  And Saddam better watch out, because Frodo and all them other elf-like thingies aren’t taking no for an answer.  The quest continues to get to Mordor so they can destroy the all-powerful ring.  Of course, Saruman won’t let the good-doers get close without one hell of a fight.
 
We join our cast of thousands in the middle part of a really, really long story.  All the heroes are divided from the last flick.  Frodo (Elijah Wood) and Sam (Sean Astin) are wandering around trying to get to that giant melting pot on the other side of the border (insert immigration joke here).  Along the way they pick up an extremely ugly talking puppy named Smeagol (Andy Serkis) to guide them.  Of course, he’s probably the best character in there.  12 year old girls would protest this, since they are all swooning after Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen) and Legolas (Orlando Bloom).  Both of them, along with their hairy and stumpy puppy, Gimli (John Rhys-Davies), are trekking the country and searching for everyone else.  Merry (Dominic Monaghan) and Pippin (Billy Boyd) escape the Orcs (as themselves) and become one with nature by befriending the tree creatures called Ents (interestingly, also played by the Orcs).  Together, they separately fight/sit and talk to beat Saruman (Christopher Lee) and his giant Orc army.
 
Okay.  All plot description aside, this installment didn’t really thrill me as much.  Consider me indifferent towards the trilogy once again.  The movie was good.  It was a good movie.  If I had to pick one word to describe the movie, I would pick the word "good."  Perhaps my vocabulary needs to be expanded.  However, that’s what it is.  Not great.
 
The acting seemed worse.  I couldn’t get into the characters again, because I felt like they forced it too much.  Everyone is included in this lot.  The worst offenders being the CGI characters.  Voice acting does not mean you have to overcompensate for your lack of face time by giving a cartoony performance.  It is possible to be just a voice and still do a nice, understated and purposeful job.
 
The CGI stuff looked better this time around.  Most was still unnatural, but Smeagol essentially wowed me.  The interaction with Frodo and Sam went smoothly and the detail in the facial reactions worked better than imagined.  If I were to change anything about the character…I would give him smaller eyes.  If anything made him look fake, it was the eyes.  Granted, I don’t know the book, so if that’s what the description calls for, then I retract my statement.  I’m just saying.  Geez.  Leave me alone.  Send all hate mail to joe@filmbrats.com.  As for the rest, some of the movements clunked along, but what else can be done when there are thousands of artificial life forms on the screen taking up hard-drive space somewhere.  I guess my point is that I see a great improvement in the effects over the previous film.
 
Let’s hear it for Peter Jackson (director and co-writer) for keeping the unique visual style so apparent in the first movie.  Not hard to do when you film them all at the same time, but still.  I would also like to congratulate him on letting humans put on Orc suits for the fight scenes.  It made them that much more fun to watch.
 
Speaking of which, they sure were fun to watch.  The editing left something to be desired sometimes, like knowing what was going on, but watchers can’t be editors.  Boy, but they sure were fun to watch.
 
One more quick point to touch on, then you’ll be rid of me.  The humor in the script turned me off to the film.  Gimli all of a sudden became a joke factory instead of a respectable character of differing height.  The Ents were also given their “moments.”  I didn’t come to laugh, I came to be amazed.  How could I be amazed when I was stunned at the inappropriate comic relief.
 
Overall, if you’re a fan, you’ll love it, of course.  If you’re not, you may not enjoy it as much, but you’ll still have a good time.  Especially the last hour and a half or so.  Fighting = good.  Tell your parents Jon said so.  No.  Tell them it was Joe.

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